"To me, In Memorium is an odyssey in the working out of extended grief. I am awestruck all the more because Tennyson composed the verses in haphazard fashion over seventeen years, yet the sequence of 131 sections rings so true of a chronological account of grieving. How could Tennyson remember and capture the sequence so beautifully? How could he integrate the swirling and swinging moods: the anger, the despair, the emptiness, the search for answers, the exultation of temporary resolution... Above all, I admire Tennyson's treatment of the relationship between science and human values... As a champion of science, Tennyson lauds its power... but he knows that science cannot tell us why a man should die so young, or how a grieving lover should resolve his suffering."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Stephen Jay Gould, Dinosaur in a Haystack: Reflections in Natural History (1995)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/In_Memoriam_A.H.H.
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
In Memoriam A.H.H.
71 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by In Memoriam A.H.H. →
Related Quotes
"Strong Son of God, immortal Love, Whom we, that have not seen thy face, By faith, and faith alone, embrace, Believing…"
"Thou seemest human and divine, The highest, holiest manhood, thou. Our wills are ours, we know not how; Our wills are…"
"Our little systems have their day; They have their day and cease to be: They are but broken lights of thee, And thou,…"
"Let knowledge grow from more to more, But more of reverence in us dwell; That mind and soul, according well, May make…"
"Forgive what seem'd my sin in me; What seem'd my worth since I began; For merit lives from man to man, And not from m…"
"Forgive these wild and wandering cries, Confusions of a wasted youth; Forgive them where they fail in truth, And in t…"
"I held it truth, with him who sings To one clear harp in divers tones, That men may rise on stepping-stones Of their …"
"Let Love clasp Grief lest both be drown'd, Let darkness keep her raven gloss: Ah, sweeter to be drunk with loss, To d…"
"Old Yew, which graspest at the stones That name the under-lying dead, Thy fibres net the dreamless head, Thy roots ar…"
"Who keeps the keys of all the creeds."